Wednesday, August 13, 2014

What Rush Limbaugh actually said

If you have even momentarily grazed across any of the left-wing media outlets, online especially, you've probably come across someone bashing Rush Limbaugh for claiming that Robin Williams killed himself because he was weak or had a left-wing worldview or political leaning.

One of the celeb blogs I troll for saucy images had a piece by the proprietor, who fancies himself the perfect arbiter of righteous indignation. Especially when it comes to bashing conservatives. When the Zimmerman/Martin news broke, this guy (who basically makes d*ck jokes for a living) was screaming racism from the outset. When it turned out that George Zimmerman wasn't an 80 year old white guy, he just doubled down and said all whites were still racist and were to blame for the whole mess.

So this guy went off on Limbaugh, quoting loosely from a Mediate piece (which I did not read) to give the impression that Limbaugh said Williams' leftist worldview left him depressed, apparently enough to kill himself. He then went into a lengthy bit lashing out with every childish insult he could muster, and managed to work in lefty tropes like sexual orientation and religion.

eesh!

Thing is, if this f*cktard had spent five minutes researching this situation, he could have found the transcript to Limbaugh's radio show that day, and would have found out that none of what got his panties in a wad was actually true.

Well, I took the time and here are some excerpts (emphasis mine) as Rush responds to a caller that is asking if politics is coloring the coverage of William's suicide:

"...in Washington, the media thinks the world is on fire because of what's happening in the Middle East, your average TMZ viewer thinks the world doesn't make any sense anymore because Robin Williams committed suicide."
"So our last caller from Des Plaines, Illinois, wanted to know, 'What is the politics in the coverage of the suicide of Robin Williams?' Well, I believe there is some. But I don't think that the politics is driving it. I think there was, on the part of media and Hollywood, genuine affection for the guy that is driving it, but there is politics. If you notice the coverage is focused on how much he had, but it wasn't enough."
"He had everything, everything that you would think would make you happy. But it didn't. Now, what is the left's worldview in general? What is it? If you had to attach not a philosophy but an attitude to a leftist worldview, it's one of pessimism and darkness, sadness. They're never happy, are they? They're always angry about something. No matter what they get, they're always angry."
"They [the left and left-wing media] are animated in large part by the false promises of America, because the promises of America are not for everyone, as we see each and every day. I mean, right here there's a story on the Fox News website. Do you know, it says right here, that the real reasons that Robin Williams killed himself are he was embarrassed at having to take television roles after a sterling movie career?"
"He had to take movie roles that were beneath him, sequels and so forth, and he finally had to do television just to get a paycheck because he was in so much financial distress...he had it all, but he had nothing. He made everybody else laugh but was miserable inside. I mean, it fits a certain picture, or a certain image that the left has. Talk about low expectations and general unhappiness and so forth."
"We all only get one life, and I don't think there's anything more precious. And, of course, I think that's something everybody alive takes for granted. Well, not all time, some people don't, obviously. But most people just take it for granted."
"I was just gonna say that there's so many people that believe in heaven that it makes somehow, sometimes life on earth just not worth it, 'cause there is something better out there. And that may be true, but it's still a life wasted, and it's the only one any of us ever get. I have always thought suicide was one of the most depressing tragedies and certainly not something that should be reported on in a way that might make others want to do it. But that's just me."

I've railed plenty of times in the past about the relentless indoctrination of our low information populace. The commenters on that blog were merciless in savaging Limbaugh, and yet not a single one of them had heard the actual radio broadcast or read the transcripts. We live in a country where young voters think a clown on Comedy Central is a newsman, and who think comments they read on blogs like the one I'm talking about here can be taken as gospel without bothering to get the real story. I saw where Twitter lit up about this, even reps from supposedly reputable news organizations where pushing the lie forward.

We live in dangerous times. Get the facts. Use your head. The truth is out there, don't just swallow what you find without question.